Call it old-fashioned if you will but it is one of the most cost-effective modes of communication! With an ROI of about 4300%, it’ll be foolish to take marketing your event through email lightly.
Time to get the email invites out to your attendees! Here are 8 tips to craft the perfect email to entice ticket sales.
Email invitation via the Peatix dashboard
Before we begin with tips, head straight to the “Promote” tab on the Peatix dashboard. From there, you may add email addresses to the “To” field from your existing mailing list. Add your message and the email invite’s good to go! You can choose from two “From” options (i.e. your organiser profile name or “Peatix event organiser”) that’ll appear in your guest’s inboxes.
Now for the tricky bit, how do you craft a message that’s enticing enough for your audience to click on the “View Event” button?
Crafting a Message for your Intended Audience
1. Be personal and sincere, tell a compelling story. Connect with your target audience on an emotional level. Show that you understand your audience through relating with similar experiences, hence the reason for the event.
2. Rouse the crowd and provide a solution. Steve Jobs famously quipped, “A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show them”. It is your job (no pun intended) as an event organiser to understand and clearly define your target audience’s needs, and logically substantiate why your event will address them.
Think about it – Is it typically difficult for professionals in the field to meet? Do they want to learn from subject matter experts or gain insights into upcoming advancements? Back your event’s credibility with data. For example, “60% of attendees met with more than five people at Backstage Pass and 80% found insights from experienced organisers useful and applicable.”
3. Have good speakers? Flaunt them! Nothing says count me in like a speaker who’s established or re-knowned in the industry. Give a short snippet of the speaker’s background and how it’ll greatly benefit your audience to come hear from their insights.
4. Repeat the call-to-action to get tickets. Short-term memory is as it is, short. To ensure you keep making an impression on your audience to “get tickets”, repeat that call-to-action throughout your email. Once at the beginning, another in between, and once more at the end should suffice. Give sound logical reasoning each time as to why one should attend followed by the event link.
5. Track your email invite link by using Google URL builder or Bit.ly. When your audience clicks on the link generated via Google, this will be reflected in the “Overview” tab within the Peatix dashboard as a domain referral from your given “Campaign Source” specified (e.g. sg_footer). This gives you a clue as to whether your message is effective in converting email previews to event views. Bit.ly links also gives insight as to when and how many are clicking on your link.
6. Generate social proof that your event rocks. Harness the inherent social psychological need to belong by featuring previous events or garnering testimonials from previous event attendees. Send out another reminder email to sign-up two weeks before the event date and should you have limited spots by then, proudly declare it so as to get people clamouring for the last few tickets.
7. Create exclusivity. We like to feel valued, especially your regular attendees who constantly show you their support by simply turning up. Reward them by first informing them of an upcoming event! Let them be the first to be in the know and to sign up for any early-bird offers you might have on tickets before releasing the news to the public.
8. Address potential objections. “Not available on Friday night?” Excuses, perhaps. If an attendee sees the value in coming, they will make the time to come. The onus is upon you to make clear what attendees will gain by coming despite the plethora of other things they could do on any particular time of day.
Top Image Credit: Shutterstock
Watch this space: A series of tips on “Sell Out Events” will be brought to you by Peatix in the coming weeks. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter!
